Tag: Two of Pentacles

Today’s card is from a really pretty new deck. I’m fast falling in love with it. In a strange way, it reminds me of Dana Driscoll’s Tarot of Trees. I can’t really place my finger on exactly WHY it does but it has something to do with the intensity of the colors, I think.

Here we have the Two of Pentacles. Traditionally a card of choices, I see this raven as something of a trickster. There is a connection between the twos and the Major Arcana II the Magician so maybe that is why. Of course, the Raven CAN be a trickster in many beliefs.

Still, here it looks as if he is pulling coins out of thin air. It can certainly feel that way when we are making money choices, can’t it? As if we don’t have enough and will never have enough?

I think this card is a reminder to me to think abundantly while living carefully. I have a lot of good things going on right now so I am able to afford things I couldn’t in my 20’s. But that doesn’t mean I need to buy the whole horse when I all I want to do is ride one hour a week. 😀

How do you balance your abundant living thinking with your carefully budget life? Do you think one negates the other?

I don’t. I think carefully budgeting myself while calling in prosperity is my “Yes, okay” to the Universe. I’m making a promise not to squander the abundance. I’m making a choice to be careful with my wealth.

And? I don’t see wealth as money alone. Pentacles are the suit of community and earth as well as money. So my friends and family and pets are all covered in this abundant life.

Today I accept that I live in abundance. I acknowledge my right to a prosperous life. I embrace the wholeness of my wealthy, healthy self.

Today’s card reminds me of something I heard today. The quote was by a man named John O’Donohue who died in 2008. He said

“The normal way never leads home.”

I learned two things when I heard that. The first was that I needed to get his work. The second was that I had no definition of what home might mean in that quote.

Living in Austin, I can certainly identify with the idea of not being normal. I’ve decided that if I ever do leave this mecca of weird, I will go to another mecca of diversity and unusual. I need to be where the norm is to be uniquely myself.

I am not like you. You are not like me. Like everyone else, we are unique. Isn’t that an amazing concept? Consider it for just a minute. No one on earth is just like you. No one has your life experiences or your truths or sorrows or joys.

Many of us have similar. Many of us have shared in the same experience. But how many of us have come away from those shared experiences with different outlooks?

When I went ocean kayaking with my best friend, we fell in. Whether we fell in courtesy of me or her is a matter of opinion. I’m willing to believe her when she says I tumped us in. I saw a WHALE. (Tumping is what I was taught you do when you turn a boat over. 😀 )

So my experience of being in the water THISCLOSE to a humpback was thrilling as well as humorous. But what was Cai’s experience? I know that when I was pointing out how close the whale was, she somewhat tartly pointed out that I should be getting back in the kayak so she could too.

It may have been April and it may have been slightly brisk in the water that day.

But our experiences were not the same. Neither of us was angry at the other. Far from it! We laughed our butts off. But I think you would hear two different stories from that day that we went swimming quite unexpectedly with whales.

The Two of Pentacles from Aly Fell and Barbara Moore’s fantastic Steampunk Tarot shows a woman on an old-fashioned bicycle. There is a neon lemniscate acting as the chain. She appears to be riding on water or clouds. The sky above her shows a storm breaking. Or is it gathering? Is she finally leaving shelter to head on her way? Is she hurrying for shelter before the storm hits?

Your personal story will lend flavor to this card and every card in a spread. As a reader, you must acknowledge that. Some of it will need to be put aside if you are reading for another, but if you are reading for yourself, understanding how your own mood can blend into the cards is key.

So, when you look at this card, given your current mood and understanding of where you are, is she fleeing the storm or has the storm passed?

I have this insatiable urge to tilt the whole thing just a bit to the right to fix that.

Today’s card is one of my Zentangles. I haven’t written down which tangle is which Tarot…if I were doing a Tangle Tarot. And I’m not. 😀 Yet.

But this would be the Two of Pentacles. I like how this one turned out. There are so many patterns here. I count nine altogether. The two that seem most important are the large ovals. They aren’t quite balanced, are they? I have this insatiable urge to tilt the whole thing just a bit to the right to fix that.

And if I did, wouldn’t the one on the left fall over? Maybe this off-kilter card really is balanced. Maybe this is what balanced looks like.

“If I paint a wild horse, you might not see the horse… but surely you will see the wildness!” ~ Pablo Picasso 1881-1973

And I have to agree with Picasso on this. Perhaps what you see here is not the actual Two of Coins but the essence of the balance of this card.

I know for myself that balance is a funny thing. I sometimes whine about no me time, but then again, the only person saying yes to the stress is moi. Likewise, the only person who can clear up my social calendar is the same person–me.

What about you? Do you ever feel like your life is nothing but running and gunning with very little funning? 😀 Sorry, but the punning will continue.

How about this? For 180 seconds today, that magical three minutes, can you commit to NOT worrying about whether your life is balanced or not? Can you simply live your life for three minutes celebrating the fact that you are living it?

Then I read the balloon to the right and it mentioned “self-care”. OH! This wasn’t about shaking Michelle Obama’s hand for saying “Seek Joy, Y’all” to the world. It wasn’t about hugging Oprah as she touted my book. It was about …

Today’s card is a reminder of balance and choices. The Two of Pentacles is one of those cards that always makes me wonder if I am balancing my personal life and my professional. And this is a gorgeous rendition of this card.

It’s from the Faerie Tarot by Nathalie Hertz (US Games 2008). Sadly it is out of print but you can still find it if you look.

One thing to note about this card is the hourglass. Do you see it? Try to focus on the entire picture rather than just the central image. There now. Do you have it?

“Like sand through the hourglass, so are the days of our lives.”

I heard that a lot growing up. I wasn’t a “Days Of OUr Lives” watcher (ABC girl here), but an important person in my life was.

If these are, in fact, the days of your life…the only days you are given in this free trip around the Universe, are you doing everything you can to balance things?

It’s lovely to be successful in business.
It’s lovely to be successful in love.

But what about being successful in both? Oh, we’ve all heard the stories about the business person who gave their all to the job only to lose everyone they loved. Scrooge, anyone?

But this lovely girl is using a wheelbarrow. She’s making it work in a field of wheat.

We can too. We can have it all. I think, for me, the all is what is important. What is “all” to me?

You know I’m working through a great workbook. I’m at a point where I am to list 100 goals for 2013. My pen has hovered over the page for two days now. What 100 things would I want to accomplish?

Then I read the balloon to the right and it mentioned “self-care”. OH! This wasn’t about shaking Michelle Obama’s hand for saying “Seek Joy, Y’all” to the world. It wasn’t about hugging Oprah as she touted my book. It was about me.

My pen fell on the paper and before I could stop it, I had “drink three pots of tea with Leah” and “have dinner with Ashton more” and “get a minimum of 6 hours worth of naps a month.”

Self-care.

What will you do today to care for you?

By the way? That workbook? I gave away two to newsletter readers yesterday. Silly me didn’t realize I had bought three.

SO! Leave a comment here for a chance to win. If you share this, that’s a second chance but you have to comment first. If you share, leave a comment that you did.

I’ll announce winners on Friday. I’m running this on my Facebook page as well and yes, you can enter both places.

Join The Joy Tribe!Only way to get Tarotscopes now plus first look at lesson videos and free exclusive reading sessions.
Buy the bookSubscribe to get my free book on Intuitive Tarot10 Fairy Tale Tarot Spreads with art by Lisa Hunt